so long, farewell

well, well. time has certainly flown by since last i updated the ol' airstream blog.

to make a long story short our plans for the trailer have 'evolved'. just about the time of my last bulletin, last year i discovered that i was pregnant with lee and i's first child.
overjoyed as we were, we were a little bummed about the plans for our airstream.
plans for footloose, dirt-broke cross country travel being put on hold indefinetly.
however, a year later and a 7 week old baby girl (coral wendy) in tow, we realize that buying this trailer and making it our home is still one of the smartest things we've ever done. albeit, it's serving a slightly different purpose than what was originally intended.
undertaking a project of this size, next to our having a child is the 'biggest' thing we've done as a couple. it has been hugely challenging (at one point, while pregnant, the mildew smell in the trailer would trigger my morning sickness so that anytime i ever approached the airstream and thought about going inside, i'd puke!) and hugely rewarding (seeing how awesome it's turned out).
though finding storage space is always a tricky, the our airstream is 'cozy'. it feels homey and warm. it's our own little club house.

so here are some updated photo's of the airstream/family homestead/'gypsy caravan', which i'm sure everyone will find vastly different from the half finished renovation pic's i last posted.

our plans now, are to hang tight here in the tin can until fall. we're in the process of deciding/figuring out where our new home will be and in what form.
the airstream may become a home for someone we know, an ultra sweet office for lee or it could be up for sale at some point in the near future (though that's the least favorite of the aforementioned options.
i suppose this is a little good-bye to the 'home sweet home' blog.
if you, the reader, have any questions about your own renovation or for whatever reason you'd like to get in contact with me, i check my email often: shanlie_futhey@yahoo.com
take care!

my little house

is an absolute pleasure to keep clean!
my old home used to be such a pain to tidy up, but i actually enjoy cleaning up in here.
meanwhile, i've continued to decorate and hang things on the walls while we wait to finish the kitchen and bath.
i found a copy of 'alice in wonderland' and have been framing up the illustrations.
we haven't been able to do much lately, but we'll get there.
i've got new pic's to add to the blog soon.

little/gigantic hiccups

so, i feel like i need to expound on a couple of snags we've run into recently and solutions that we've come across.

problem 1: sticky walls
solution 1: the vinyl coated sheet metal walls that are in older airstreams feel strangely sticky to the touch and paint doesn't stick very well when applied on this dysfunctional material.
i found a site online (and added a link to the right, 'mr. know-it-all') that had a phenomenal fix for this annoying problem. at 'ace hardware' and online, there is a product called 'future floor wax', that (magically and inexplicably) reduces the sticky feel of the walls. it creates some sort of invisible coating.
annnnnyhow...the best part of the whole scheme is that a large bottle of wax costs less than $10.

problem 2: mold, mildew, stink
solution 2: a pretty straight forward problem, but when it's all over everything it's absolutely terrifying. we used two products ('simple green' and 'grease lightning'), water, scouring pads and a towel. the biggest dilemma is getting to all of it. we made sure to scrub off all that we could get to and primed over everything afterward. that stagnant smell wasn't as much of a problem as we'd expected once everything had been painted, aired out and after we burned a few sticks of nag champa (incense), the smell is gone.

problem 3: discolored plastic trim (around vista windows, shower, etc)
solution 3: it was hard to tell what would come clean and what wouldn't. sometimes soap and water worked, but usually special plastic spray paint did the trick. for the shower, and the fiberglass stall, we had to use a gel coat paint spray it on. you have to buy the gel coat paint at a boating or specialty paint store.

problem 4: weird pipes
solution 4: some of the plumbing pipes were crazy sizes. to quote our local 'home depot' expert (insert southern drawl here), "in twenty years of workin' here, i've never seen pipe that size".claaaasic! not what you want to hear about the metal piping running all underneath your floor.
thanks goodness my dad is super-handyman; he welds, and (after hours of work) was able to connect the replacement pipes to the originals.
if not for him, i don't know how we would have been able to fix this problem. i'm sure we would have had to hire someone to handle it, since nowhere we went had the right size piping.

that's really all i can think of at the moment, but i know we'll be running into more problems before we're finished.
i'll update this specific post as things come up.

new (old) photos

i took these pictures a while ago, but hadn't had them developed until yesterday.

we've gotten lots and lots done since they were taken.

the mold for the sink

the slimy old window sealing we have to take off

peace!

soon there'll be a new counter top here!

our floor in the bedroom

a close-up of the sink

the faucet for the kitchen

the painted living room

the kitchen

the painted air conditioning cover

the re-covered fridge

'airstream control center'

mini-update

i know it's been a while since any updates or news, but it's coming, i promise!
i did add a new like (mr. know-it-all), that i found to be helpful. it had a tip for remedying our sticky-wall problem! hallelujah!
we're gonna try it out asap.
in other news, we've been running into a lot of glitches: plumbing, paint, a/c, fridge.
murphy's law type things. it's been great (insert sarcastic tone of voice here)!
i've also got a camera full of pictures to develop as well.
until next time!

bamboo banga

lee, sam and dad laid the flooring the bedroom this past weekend.
the type of flooring is a little weird, you can either glue it or nail it, but we chose to do both to be safe from any shifting or other complications while traveling.
the men-folk said it was pretty easy.

the new bamboo on the plywood sub-floor

sam working hard

lee pre-drilling holes for the nails in the bamboo

sam hammering the bamboo in place

lee adding the glue

the bamboo trim isn't really going to be an option what with all of the curves in the airstream. we'll try and find some sort of an attractive rubber trim as an alternative.
i'll be posting some new pic's tomorrow or the next day.

light at the end of the tunnel

up until the end of the day yesterday, i had totally been ready to throw in the towel and give up on all of this renovation nonsense.
it's true.
this trailer had so much more work to be done than we had initially anticipated & if i had known then what i know now about it, we would probably never have bought it. we would have saved up for longer to buy on in better condition starting out.
i feel a lot better today; my attitude is good.
yesterday, we ripped out the kitchen, poured new counter tops, painted, finished the plumbing. we cleaned and did lots of little detail work that helps with the overall appearance.
it's encouraging.
we also found out that the fridge doesn't work. potentially disastrous. a new gas/electric fridge would have cost us a couple thousand dollars, and we wouldn't be able to afford that.
but my dad's friend has a new ac/dc rv fridge we can buy for only $100.
huge deal!
anyhow, i'll be working and packing up the house today (we move out in 4 days!) while the men-folk start laying the bamboo floors today, in the airstream.
i'll have lots of updated pic's soon.